Barry: "all the sauces"

The show that Barry reminds me of most is Breaking Bad, not just because they're both darkly funny crime dramas that examine the morality of their protagonists, but in how both shows burn through plot in a way that still feels organic. In particular, this season reminds of the final season of Breaking Bad, where the status quo and character dynamics were upended in nearly every episode.

"all the sauces" deals with the fallout from the previous episode, where Barry takes a job from Hank to assasinate Fernando by planting a bomb underneath Cristobal's house. The A-plot is vintage Barry, with Barry having to slowly and cautiously place the bomb underneath the house and use a phone app to detonate it, only for the app to malfunction. What starts as a darkly funny scene turns serious when an unsuspecting Cristobal arrives home only to be confronted by Fernando on his affair with Hank and is faced with the choice to either kill his lover or die himself. It's a tense scene given that the show isn't afraid to kill off characters, but Cristobal manages to escape the house just as Barry finally manages to detonate the bomb and is taken home to Hank by Barry.

Gene is also dealing with the fallout from the previous episode, as he attempts to covince his family to leave LA to escape Barry. only to be told by his agent that his outburst on set has led to an extension of his role on Laws and Humanity. Gene is too afraid of Barry to be concerned with the possible resurgence of his career, even after Joe Mantegna commends him on his work with a veteran and promises to lift the restrainig order he has against Gene (a common running gag throughout the season is alluding to Gene's career and how truly awful his behavior must have been). It takes Barry dropping by with the money he got from the hit and a promise to never bother Gene again for the latter to change his mind about running away.

Gene isn't the only person that Barry has burned bridges with. Sally's show Joplin has it's premiere where Barry fails to show up and Sally is a nervous wreck over presenting the show. Her tune changes quickly when she learns that the show has received near critical acclaim and she becomes emotional on the podium. For someone who has breathed life into what could've easily been a cartoonishly drawn character, Sarah Goldberg gives what is her best performance yet in this episode, making Sally's reaction feel organic and natural with what we know of the character. It was only a matter of time before Katie came to Sally with her observation that Barry is a violent person, but what's truly surprising is that Sally actually listens to her and proceeds to break up with Barry. While I wish that we got more scenes between Sally and Barry to better build up the breakup, the scene is expertly performed by both Hader and Goldberg and will undoubtedley fuel Barry's downward spiral going forward.

Notes:

* While Barry is dealing with the consequences of his actions, Fuches pretends to be a private investigator and visits the family of the man Barry killed back in the pilot to inform them of Barry's involvement and how the police let him get away. This storyline is mainly set up for what will presumably be the backbone of the second half of the season, but it's a nice bit of continuity and establishes Fuches as a slimy mastermind.

* D'Arcy Carden hasn't had much to do in this season as I would've liked, but every scene with her in this episode is hilarious, from her critique of Sally's speech to hogging the limelight on the red carpet.

* Plenty of humor in an otherwise heavy episode, such as Hank's setting up the detonator app on Barry;'s phone and Gene's agent (played by Fred Melamed) listing the various insults people have leveled against Gene due to his past behavior.

Barry: "ben mendelson"

It was only a matter of time before Barry returned to killing. "ben mendelson" is a necessary slow down from the intensity of the previous two episodes, focusing mainly on Barry's self-delusion and the reality of the situation around him.

Barry thinks that things between him and Gene are good now that he got Gene a part on Laws and Humanity. He genuinely believes that him and Gene can have the same relationship that they had before Gene discovered that he killed Janice. The scene where Gene asks him if Janice suffered and Barry's attempts to deflect show just how self-deluded he is. Janice's murder will forever drive a wedge between them, yet Barry's too egotistical to accept this. It takes Gene punching him during the shoot and telling him to stay away from him and his family for Barry's rose-tinted glasses to fall off and for him to realize that his connection with Gene is severed. He accepts Hank's offer because he truly has nowhere else to go, so why not embrace the worst aspects of himself?

The episode checks back in with Fuches as he is adapting to life in Chechnya. Like Barry, he initially rejects Hank's offer of returning to LA until the latter tells him that Barry no longer wants to kill him. The phone call Fuches has with Barry shows that he is just as self-deluded and egotistical as Barry, if not more so, in that he believes Barry owes him an apology for trying to kill him. His caretaker (and lover?) Anna attempts to console him by telling him a sixteenth-century parable about choosing between vengeance and forgiveness. Sociopath that he is, Fuches can only focus on the vengeance aspect of the story. The ominous music that plays over the end credits promises that this already dark season will be even darker.

Notes:

* Elsie Fisher's Katie is easily the best new addition on this season of Barry. Her facial expressions during her talk with Natalie as the latter defends Barry and her interview is an excellent bit of silent acting speaks volumes about how she's the only person on this show who can see Barry for who he truly.

* Henry Winkler gives perhaps his best performance yet in this episode. His thousand-yard stare during the episode's cold open and incredulous glare as Barry attempts to console him about Janice's death

* Some nice continuity from the previous episode where the showrunner of Laws and Humanity remembers Gene as having thrown hot tea in his face back when he was a PA. Gene having to be reminded of this specific incident speaks volumes about how tumultuous his past must've been and leads into the moment where Barry compares his sins to his own.

Barry: "forgiving jeff"

Returning after a three-year hiatus, Barry has proven to be one of TV’s most unexpected gems. It’s simple premise (a hitman deciding to become an actor) could’ve easily been a Breaking Bad/Dexter rip off, but not only was it's first season very good, Season 2 proved to even better by delving into the titular character’s past and begging the question if he could truly change while fleshing out the world and characters around him.

The scene that opens "forgiving jeff" may very well be the show's thesis statement. Barry prepares to execute a man named Jeff for having an affair with another man's wife (a call back to the pilot, where he was contracted to kill a fellow actor who was sleeping with a mob boss' wife), only for the latter to call it off and forgive him. Barry's response? Execute the both of them and storm off, shouting that there is no forgiving Jeff. If the past two seasons were about Barry trying to become a better person and leave his hitman past behind, this season opens with Barry completely given into his murderous urges, scouring the Web for contracts while lying to Sally that he is lining up acting gigs. Bill Hader is fantastic in this episode, conveying the appearance of a man who's completely given up and has numbly resigned himself to the darkness that is his life.

Meanwhile, Hank is dealing with the aftermath of Barry's assault on the monastery. In a hilarious scene, Hank goes into an interrogation and pins the blame on Fuches, who he dubs as a mysterious assassin called "The Raven". His and Barry's storylines for this episode intersect when Barry shows up late at night to his house and asks for a job, only for Hank to furiously rebuff him and inform that "forgiveness must be earned".

The true star of the episode however is Gene and his reaction to the news that Barry killed his lover Janice. Barry has always excelled at plotting and the way the premiere upends the status quo and the Barry-Gene relationship is no exception. After his attempts to go to the police fail, Gene invites Barry over to his office and confronts him with a gun. In true comic fashion, the gun falls apart before Gene even points it at Barry and the latter takes him out into the desert to kill him. Gene begs for his life, promising to not tell anyone and that he forgives Barry. Still hearing Hank's words that forgiveness must be earned, Barry is suddenly jolted by the idea that he can earn Gene's forgiveness, before telling Gene to get back in the truck. Where the show goes next I have absolutely no idea, but color me excited to find out.

Notes:

* Sally's plot is separate from the other storylines in the episode, but no less compelling. Following her showcase last season where she spun the story of her abusive ex into a much more shallow, Hollywood-type story, Sally is now the creator and star of a semi-autobiographical television show called Joplin. Judging from the few snippets we see, it's a by-the-numbers melodrama about a mother trying to save her daughter from an abusive relationship.

* The one scene we get of Fuches shows that he is in the Chechen mountains following his escape at the end of Season 2. He's not living his best life, having to get milk for his cereal from a goat and complaining about the lack of cable, but at least he has Anna to keep him company.

* Speaking of people living their best lives, Hank and Cristobal are finally(!) an item after Season 2 endlessly teased their romance. While I'm glad they were able to patch things up following Hank's rogue assassination attempt, there is some trouble in paradise with Cristobal still upset over the fact that Barry killed all his friends. The look on Anthony Carrigan's face as Cristobal says he has no one is both hilarious and heartbreaking.

* Another hilarious scene; Barry on the phone with a potential contract who wants Barry to kill her husband while trying to buy flowers for Sally. 

* D'Arcy Carden's Natalie was mainly a joke character in the first two seasons, so it's great that she semes to have a bigger role this season shadowing Sally at her television gig. The change in her facial expressions as Sally condescendingly tells her to make her a snack is exceptional.

* Gene has managed to fully reconcile with his son, enough that he's living in his house for what seems to be a permanent fixture and has a relationship with his grandson. He's also closed his acting school, presumably because he wouldn't be able to face Barry at that point.

* Some truly wonderful shots in this episode, my favorite being the tracking shot of Sally walking through the set giving orders to the crew.

*Nice visual motif of Barry imagining Sally and Gene getting shot with sniper bullets while talking to him. A reminder of his Afghanistan experience and detiorating mental state

* That two-minute "Previously On" was probably done by HBO on account of the show being on hiatus for three years. At least it caught my dad up to speed.